Venting

Monday, December 05, 2005

2 birds with 1 stone!!

An article in today’s local paper, The Courier Post, talks about making it easier to get rid of Canadian Geese. I am an animal lover, and have rescued several dogs from Camden & the pounds. But, I really hate these birds. They leave their dropping all over, polluting lakes and ponds, making walking around these water ways impossible unless you wear a biohazard suit. Have you ever tried to play golf and while hitting your ball you hit goose droppings? It EXPLODES everywhere!!

And now there is the threat of Avian flu. These birds would be a prime candidate to spread the disease. Let’s take care of the problem before it happens.

Of course the animal rights people want you to rent dogs to chase them away, but they always return, because they return to were there is easy access to food. And of course there are the STUPID people who feed them at every lake & park.

I have a solution. It will take care of 2 birds with one stone – pun intended!!

There are so many people in the US that are homeless and hungry. Why not use these birds to feed them? If goose is good enough for Little Timmy & Scrooge for Christmas dinner, it should be good enough for the hungry. This way we take care of the over population of geese and the hungry all at the same time. Do you have a better idea?

Wednesday, April 06, 2005

More Divert This!!

More Divert This!!

One of the biggest offenders of the Divert/Bypass status for hospital Emergency Rooms in the area is Cooper Hospital in Camden City (the most dangerous city in the US). Granted they are a busy hospital and several reasons are listed in my Blog, 911 Help!! But we have gone there when they have been on status, and there were empty beds all over the place, and nurses sitting around painting their nails. Then the give us a nasty attitude for bringing them a patient. The attitudes of the staff towards EMS and patients is horrible. This is a big reason they are losing patients and money.

People who are legitimately sick or injured, don’t want to be treated bad. They also don’t want to wait for hours to be seen by the doctor. The staff should remember they got into this field to help people. A little bit of good customer service goes a long way.

Instead of looking at the reasons the paying customers are leaving, management decides to spend tons of money on PR. They now have a commercial on the big TV networks, running in prime time, of Kelly Ripa saying how good a hospital Cooper is. How much could this be costing the hospital?

Management needs to do some investigating of their services. They need to come into the ER as a patient or send in a friend, so the staff has no idea they know management, and see how they are treated and make a report. I think they will be flabbergasted!! Maybe they need to add more staff in the ER to make things go faster. Be nice to EMS and patients.
How many people does 1 person know? How many people can I tell about the bad service? You are reading this, aren’t you? Management needs to wake up and smell the coffee.

Wednesday, March 16, 2005

DIVERT this!!! BYPASS that!!!

EMS in southern NJ is tired of hearing that such and such hospital is on DIVERT, that hospital is on BYPASS. Part of the problem is the reasons in my 1st rant. The other is hospital staffing.

Many of the hospitals are closing down floors and shutting down beds. They say they can’t afford the staffing. So when the hospital fills all of the beds, the ER must hold the patients till beds open up. This causes the ER to go on BYPASS and DIVERT status. This means that ambulances are asked to go to another hospital.

Now the other ERs start filling up also. Causing them to go on BYPASS and DIVERT. In Camden County this is almost a daily routine. What is EMS to do?

Because the ERs are now full, the staff gets cranky. So when all the ERs are full, EMS considers all are open. Now when we bring them a patient, we hear all the rood & nasty remarks, “Don’t you know we are on BYPASS or DIVERT?” “Why did you bring that patient here?” EMS isn’t the only ones hearing the remarks, the patient is too. How do you think that makes them feel? They don’t want to be there in the 1st place. Now they know they aren’t wanted either.

So the patient tells all of their family and friends about their experience. So the hospital has now lost a lot of future business. How many people does one person know?

Now we go back to the part about the hospital not having enough money to pay for staffing. The management of the hospital spends so many millions of dollars on advertising trying to get people to come to their hospital, that the staff has pissed off. Maybe management should go under cover and see why they are losing customers.

ER staff must remember that there is no sign on their building that flashes NO VACANCY or CLOSED. EMS brings patients where they ask to go, if we don’t it can be considered kidnapping. They have a job because we bring them paying customers. If you want to have a job in the future, don’t piss of the patients or EMS!!

Saturday, March 12, 2005

911!! Help!!! I am being robbed along, with the rest of you!!

911!! Help!!! I am being robbed along, with the rest of you!!
I work in the medical field in the pre-hospital area. I am a paramedic in NJ. Everyday I see the waste of my tax dollars. I work in the County that has the nation’s most dangerous city, Camden.

Abuse of the 911 system is unbelievable. No one here seems to have a family doctor. If the people who were sick went to their doctor, instead of calling 911, Medicare & Medicaid could save millions of dollars. Just in NJ alone!!

What does a doctor’s visit cost? $50 to $100 bucks? What does an ER visit cost? $1000 or more?

Everyday we get calls, through 911, my baby has a runny nose, we need to go to the ER. I have a tooth ache, I need to go to the ER. I have athlete’s foot, I need to go to the ER. I’ve got the clap, I need to go to the ER. I ran out of my medicine, I need to go to the ER. I have a sore throat, I need to go to the ER.

Of course most of these people don’t have insurance, they have Medicare & Medicaid. So when they call 911, not only is there a bill generated for the ER visit, there is a bill issued for the ambulance transport.

This abuse is also affecting the ER’s here. Almost on a daily basis, our ER’s are on divert or bypass, meaning they want ambulances to go elsewhere. The waits in the ER before seeing a doctor are approaching 6 hours.

While the ambulances are tied up with this bull crap, the people with the true emergencies have to wait for an ambulance to free up. God help you if you are having a heart attack and there is no ambulance available for you. You will lose heart muscle, because time makes a difference in this case.

Many times a day, on the Camden EMS channel you will here the dispatchers telling the chief that they are holding “X” amount of calls with “X” amount being life threats (serious calls).

Something needs to be done!! EMS needs the power to say NO to the bull shit transports. But as soon as this happens, the lawyers will come out of the woodwork. NJ has like 3 lawyers per person. Doctors need to see their patients, not tell them to go to the ER. The doctors are afraid of being sued, so they say let me take myself out of the loop and send everyone who calls to the ER.

I got into this field because I wanted to help people, but now I need the peoples help changing the system!!